ok forward as possibly awaiting him somewhere in the dim
future, was, maybe, almost at hand. Circumstances combined to prolong
these rose-tinted dreams. A sudden press of orders made it necessary to
run the shop till late nights. He contrived with difficulty to get out
early one evening so as to call on Madeline; but she had gone out, and he
failed to see her. It was some ten days after the picnic that, on calling
a second time, he found her at home. It chanced to be the very evening of
the day on which the conversation between Madeline and Cordis, narrated
in the last chapter, had taken place.

She did not come in till Henry had waited some time in the parlour, and
then gave him her hand in a very lifeless way. She said she had a bad
head-ache, and seemed disposed to leave the talking to him. He spoke of
the picnic, but she rather sharply remarked that it was so long ago that
she had forgotten all about it. It did seem very long ago to her, but to
him it was very fresh. This cool ignoring of all that had happened that
day in modifying their relations at one blow knocked the bottom out of
all his thinking for the past week, and left him, as it were, all in the
air. While he felt that the moment was not propitious for pursuing that
topic, he could not for the moment turn his mind to anything else, and,
as for Madeline, it appeared to be a matter of entire indifference to her
whether anything further was said on any subject. Finally, he remarked,
with an effort to which the result may appear disproportionate--

"Mr. Taylor has been making quite extensive alterations on his house,
hasn't he?"

"I should think you ought to know, if any one. You pass his house every
day," was her response.

"Why, of course I know," he said, staring at her.

"So I thought, but you said 'hasn't he?' And naturally I presumed that
you were not quite certain."

She was evidently quizzing him, but her face was inscrutable. She looked
only as if patiently and rather wearily explaining a misunderstanding. As
she played with her fan, she had an unmistakable expression of being
slightly bored.

"Madeline, do you know what I should say was the matter with you if you'
were a man?" he said, desperately, yet trying to laugh.

"Well, really"--and her eyes had a rather hard expression--"if you prefer
gentlemen's society, you'd better seek it, instead of trying to get along
by supposing me to be a gentleman."

"It seems as if I couldn't say anythin